When it came time to conduct the funeral, my uncle started asking us tons of questions. He asked what we wanted in the bulletin/handout, whatever its called for a funeral. I didn't know and I didn't care! But he gave some suggestions and that got us to thinking about the things we wanted. One of the things that we thought to put in was his name and it's meaning. While that may not seem significant, it actually was interesting how it turned out. His first name was Corban, which means, "a gift devoted to God." His middle name was Kale, which means, "free man." So, what was ironic was that he lived up to his name, "A free man, devoted to God."
If you remember from previous posts, I said that I was much more protective of Corban and he was a much happier baby than Von. Because he was happy SO much of the time, I just took lots and lots pictures of him ALL the time. This became an asset when it came to the funeral. My dad made a video for the funeral. It was the pictures essentially on a slideshow with the song, "glory baby," written and sung by Watermark, playing in the back ground of the video. During the funeral, you could hear people sniffing from crying during the video. That song can still bring tears to my eyes.
I was very disconnected from my emotions during the whole event. While people were at my house, during the funeral, and during each and every step of the way that week afterwards. When Jess got to town, she brought all the drama with her that she always has in her life. I love her, drama and all! When we got to the funeral, I took her up to see Corban in the bassinet. Jess broke down crying so bad that I almost had to carry her to a seat to calm down. But I had to just walk away and leave her with her boyfriend to comfort her because I couldn't let her consume all of my time. I had so many people to greet as they came into see him.
Due to my lack of emotions during the funeral, I was told that I smiled throughout most of the funeral. Denial at it's finest. God sustained me emotionally, physically and spiritually. I had the opportunity to shine my light for Christ after I went back to work at Lowe's. There were many there that knew me, simply because my son had passed away. But after a couple of months I quit and decided to go back to school. There was one person that I had a chance to tell him about Christ, he asked me about my faith a year after Corban passed away. My mother-in-law was in town and I asked him if we could get together after she left. He said that would be good, and I didn't think of it again until a few months later. I went to go see him at Lowe's only to find out that he had gotten fired and within a month was found dead from a cocaine overdose. I still feel guilty that I didn't take the time to do what was most important in life, and tell him what brings me joy in my life and what I'm truly devoted to, that being God, Himself. And my relationship with Christ.
Until another day! May God bless you in your path!!
Monday, June 9, 2014
Friday, April 11, 2014
Corban's Funeral Preparation
Wow! That last post was a lot harder to write than I thought it would be... but I made it through it!! This next post may be a bit disjointed as I don't remember all of the details because I was in a bit of a fog. But I'll do my best. :-)
Well, after we got past the shock of his death ourselves, we had to call our family and break the news to them. We wanted to get away from the house so that we could gather our thoughts about telling our parents, siblings but even harder, we had to tell Von. We asked the police officers if we could go get lunch and come back. They told us no!!! Can you believe they had right to tell us that we couldn't leave our own home!! I asked if we could just go on a walk to get away from the house for a minute. They told us that before we went on a walk, that we had to be interrogated first. I couldn't believe it!! They thought we had killed our son!! When the police officer pulled me into her car, she apologized for having to question me when I was going through such a situation. After that, I let my guard down a little and told her that I understood that she was just doing her job.
We finally went on a walk to get away from everything and everyone that was in our house. We discussed what was going to happen next. Who we should call and tell, and who we should just let them find out through the grapevine. I agreed to call my parents, brother and Jess. Michael called his parents, sister and his two best friends. Then we started talking about the finances of it all. (Yeah, I know, this is what everyone thinks of right away when their son dies. Right?!?!?)
I called my dad and I distinctly remember my parents reaction. I was talking to dad on the phone, apparently he had me on speaker phone. I am not very tactful so I simply said, "Corban's dead." My mother let out a blood curdling scream in the background!! My dad told me in a very stern voice that it wasn't ok to be joking about such things. After I convinced him that it wasn't a joke, I could hear him start to choke up as he told us that they were on their way. I don't remember calling anyone else. I'm sure that I called my brother and Jess, but I simply don't remember it. I asked my parents to call my uncle, who is a pastor, and ask if he would conduct the funeral. He said he could and came up right away. My parents were at our front door within 9 hours of receiving our call.
In the following day or two, we had tons of people at our house!! Enough people that I don't even remember who was there. Occasionally, to this day, my parents will say something about someone being at the funeral and I have no recollection of them being there.
We went to the funeral home to make plans for what to do with each section of the funeral. We wanted an open casket funeral and then we wanted him cremated because we had NO idea where to bury him. The funeral home director, Fred, told us that it would be about 8,000 to 10,000 dollars for a casket alone!!! Plus the cremation fees, plus the urn, plus transportation!! I asked why we couldn't just borrow the casket and give it back. Do you know what Fred told us???? He said that after a casket had been used it couldn't be used again because of the germs in it!!!!! They had to burn it if he didn't get buried in it!!! We told him that we would have to think it through and get back to him.
We went in the room without him. I have a problem solving brain so, I got to thinking and brainstorming ideas of what we could do. We came up with the idea of a bassinet. We asked if that would be an option and they agreed to it. How cute would a bassinet be anyway?? Well, I told some of the ladies at the church what the plan was and later that day, Michael and I went bassinet shopping. We went to Wal-mart, target, k-mart and that was all that was in our area to go look at. All of the bassinets were so joyful and playful with bright colors and animals on them. Or they had plaid and hideous ness on them. It wasn't exactly what I had in mind, but we picked one and took it home.
Before we had time to put the bassinet together, I got a phone call from the church secretary who asked if we still needed a bassinet. I told her that we had bought one from target. It wasn't ideal but it would work. She told us that a lady that used to go to their church had one that she was willing to let us use. She described it to me telling me that it was antique, white and had a half canopy over the top, just like in the movies!! I asked her if it was ever going to be used again. She told me that the lady willing to donate it was pregnant and was due any day. I asked if she was sure that she wanted a dead baby in a bassinet that she was going to use for her baby. Can you believe they were ok with it??? So, we were able to return the bassinet we bought and get our money back and get a much more appropriate bassinet for a funeral.
Michael and I had to take the bassinet to the funeral home, and we got to see Corban. I looked down at him and I was mortified!! They had cut open his forehead for the autopsy!! They explained that was to make sure that he didn't have shaken baby syndrome. But because they mutilated my baby, his face looked like a smushed tomato! I guess I didn't have a choice at that point but to be ok with it. Fred told me that I could hold him if I wanted to. But he also told me that it would be nothing like holding him before he passed. He told me that he will be stiff as a board and that many parents that hold their child regret it later. So, I chose to just look at my mutilated baby and not hold him. It didn't look much like him anyway.
It was perfect, all was coming together. Because someone loaned us the bassinet, we were able to avoid the huge charge for the casket. We had family and friends that brought in extra toilet paper, paper towels, paper plates and silverware! The ladies from the church provided enough food for the many, many people that came to our house from out of town! In fact, many opened up their homes to our family, so that they wouldn't have to stay in a hotel! We had well over 50 people come from out of town to support us! Another thing that started to happen, we started getting masses of cards from all over the world! Some from Germany, Australia, and some from many of the united states! In the cards, wasn't only notes of sympathy, but money!! When all of them had come in, we had enough money to cover the funeral and counseling for all three of us! Funny enough, we even got a sympathy card from the mailman! Who knew that he would even know what happened?!?! I counted the cards when ever they stopped coming in, and I had approximately 250.
My grandmother asked me if I wanted help writing thank you notes. I was taken back! I thought to myself, "I don't know everyone that sent a card, money, or flowers for the funeral. How am I going to know who to send thank you notes???" I told her I didn't even know where to start for that! believe or not, somehow she had thought to write down everything that we would need to thank people for! Names of the ladies that brought food, money, opened their house, gave us flowers and even those that help put the funeral details together. I was relieved!! My grandmother pulled together a group of people who wrote all my thank you notes for me! She was a lifesaver in the whole mess I would have had without her.
Ok. Well, I cannot emotionally write anymore. I'll continue next time with more details.
Until another day! May God bless you in your path!!
Well, after we got past the shock of his death ourselves, we had to call our family and break the news to them. We wanted to get away from the house so that we could gather our thoughts about telling our parents, siblings but even harder, we had to tell Von. We asked the police officers if we could go get lunch and come back. They told us no!!! Can you believe they had right to tell us that we couldn't leave our own home!! I asked if we could just go on a walk to get away from the house for a minute. They told us that before we went on a walk, that we had to be interrogated first. I couldn't believe it!! They thought we had killed our son!! When the police officer pulled me into her car, she apologized for having to question me when I was going through such a situation. After that, I let my guard down a little and told her that I understood that she was just doing her job.
We finally went on a walk to get away from everything and everyone that was in our house. We discussed what was going to happen next. Who we should call and tell, and who we should just let them find out through the grapevine. I agreed to call my parents, brother and Jess. Michael called his parents, sister and his two best friends. Then we started talking about the finances of it all. (Yeah, I know, this is what everyone thinks of right away when their son dies. Right?!?!?)
I called my dad and I distinctly remember my parents reaction. I was talking to dad on the phone, apparently he had me on speaker phone. I am not very tactful so I simply said, "Corban's dead." My mother let out a blood curdling scream in the background!! My dad told me in a very stern voice that it wasn't ok to be joking about such things. After I convinced him that it wasn't a joke, I could hear him start to choke up as he told us that they were on their way. I don't remember calling anyone else. I'm sure that I called my brother and Jess, but I simply don't remember it. I asked my parents to call my uncle, who is a pastor, and ask if he would conduct the funeral. He said he could and came up right away. My parents were at our front door within 9 hours of receiving our call.
In the following day or two, we had tons of people at our house!! Enough people that I don't even remember who was there. Occasionally, to this day, my parents will say something about someone being at the funeral and I have no recollection of them being there.
We went to the funeral home to make plans for what to do with each section of the funeral. We wanted an open casket funeral and then we wanted him cremated because we had NO idea where to bury him. The funeral home director, Fred, told us that it would be about 8,000 to 10,000 dollars for a casket alone!!! Plus the cremation fees, plus the urn, plus transportation!! I asked why we couldn't just borrow the casket and give it back. Do you know what Fred told us???? He said that after a casket had been used it couldn't be used again because of the germs in it!!!!! They had to burn it if he didn't get buried in it!!! We told him that we would have to think it through and get back to him.
We went in the room without him. I have a problem solving brain so, I got to thinking and brainstorming ideas of what we could do. We came up with the idea of a bassinet. We asked if that would be an option and they agreed to it. How cute would a bassinet be anyway?? Well, I told some of the ladies at the church what the plan was and later that day, Michael and I went bassinet shopping. We went to Wal-mart, target, k-mart and that was all that was in our area to go look at. All of the bassinets were so joyful and playful with bright colors and animals on them. Or they had plaid and hideous ness on them. It wasn't exactly what I had in mind, but we picked one and took it home.
Before we had time to put the bassinet together, I got a phone call from the church secretary who asked if we still needed a bassinet. I told her that we had bought one from target. It wasn't ideal but it would work. She told us that a lady that used to go to their church had one that she was willing to let us use. She described it to me telling me that it was antique, white and had a half canopy over the top, just like in the movies!! I asked her if it was ever going to be used again. She told me that the lady willing to donate it was pregnant and was due any day. I asked if she was sure that she wanted a dead baby in a bassinet that she was going to use for her baby. Can you believe they were ok with it??? So, we were able to return the bassinet we bought and get our money back and get a much more appropriate bassinet for a funeral.
Michael and I had to take the bassinet to the funeral home, and we got to see Corban. I looked down at him and I was mortified!! They had cut open his forehead for the autopsy!! They explained that was to make sure that he didn't have shaken baby syndrome. But because they mutilated my baby, his face looked like a smushed tomato! I guess I didn't have a choice at that point but to be ok with it. Fred told me that I could hold him if I wanted to. But he also told me that it would be nothing like holding him before he passed. He told me that he will be stiff as a board and that many parents that hold their child regret it later. So, I chose to just look at my mutilated baby and not hold him. It didn't look much like him anyway.
It was perfect, all was coming together. Because someone loaned us the bassinet, we were able to avoid the huge charge for the casket. We had family and friends that brought in extra toilet paper, paper towels, paper plates and silverware! The ladies from the church provided enough food for the many, many people that came to our house from out of town! In fact, many opened up their homes to our family, so that they wouldn't have to stay in a hotel! We had well over 50 people come from out of town to support us! Another thing that started to happen, we started getting masses of cards from all over the world! Some from Germany, Australia, and some from many of the united states! In the cards, wasn't only notes of sympathy, but money!! When all of them had come in, we had enough money to cover the funeral and counseling for all three of us! Funny enough, we even got a sympathy card from the mailman! Who knew that he would even know what happened?!?! I counted the cards when ever they stopped coming in, and I had approximately 250.
My grandmother asked me if I wanted help writing thank you notes. I was taken back! I thought to myself, "I don't know everyone that sent a card, money, or flowers for the funeral. How am I going to know who to send thank you notes???" I told her I didn't even know where to start for that! believe or not, somehow she had thought to write down everything that we would need to thank people for! Names of the ladies that brought food, money, opened their house, gave us flowers and even those that help put the funeral details together. I was relieved!! My grandmother pulled together a group of people who wrote all my thank you notes for me! She was a lifesaver in the whole mess I would have had without her.
Ok. Well, I cannot emotionally write anymore. I'll continue next time with more details.
Until another day! May God bless you in your path!!
Thursday, April 10, 2014
Corban What?!?!?!
I went to the women's Bible study for 2 months and had gone from acquaintances to friends with many of them. We were studying Philippians. So, I was learning about joy in the midst of suffering. I thought it was the best timing for a study like that as I thought it was a trial to move so far from my parents. Amazingly, studying Philippians made me so joyful it began to really change my way of thinking. I wasn't "happy" all the time, but I was empowered to be joyful.
When Corban was 5.5 months old it was March 28th. I was working at Lowe's at the time and it was a Saturday. The night before (Friday the 27th), I worked until closing and hadn't gotten home from work until 12, or maybe later. It was my habit to kiss both of my boys on the forehead each night I came in late. But I was so tired from closing that night, I decided to just go to bed and not take the extra 2 minutes to go check on them. I had to be at work at 8 the next morning. Corban woke up crying around 5:30am and I poked my husband and asked him to go check on Corban. My husband quieted him very quickly and came back to bed saying, "he just dropped his binky." (pacifier) I didn't think another thought of it and I rolled over and went back to sleep.
Saturday morning, I was getting ready and I was headed into get him up and feed him before I went to work. Michael stopped me and told me that he wanted me to let him sleep longer. He offered to just feed Corban whenever he woke up. I finished getting ready for work at a more leisurely pace, grateful that Michael was going to help out that morning.
I went to work and was discussing something with my boss when I got a phone call. I answered the phone and when I found out it was my husband I was so embarrassed. Even though he had never called me at work before, I asked him if I could call him back on my lunch break. He said no that he needed my opinion. He said, "I think Corban may be sick. He's blue, should I call an ambulance??" I'm quite sure that my face turned either really red or really white. When I said, "blue?", my boss got on the loud speaker and asked for one of my coworkers to come to the aisle we were standing in.
That day my car was in the shop for an oil change and I had no way home. My co-worker drove me home and half way home, I realized that Michael was trying to tell me that Corban was dead. Sure enough, when I got home there were 2 or 3 police cars in the driveway, but no ambulance. I stormed into the house to go check on my baby boy. The police officer told me that he had died. While restraining me, he told me that I wasn't allowed to touch him in case it was a homicide. I COULDN'T TOUCH MY OWN BABY!!!!!
My husband just stood there in shock and I went to the living room to cry on the couch. My coworker came in to console me and give me a hug. He offered to take Von out for lunch, because at the age of 3 he wouldn't understand why policemen kept showing up at the house. Soon after my coworker took Von, we had close to 10 police cars at our house.
I called one of the ladies from the quilting group and asked her to call the pastor because the police officer said that I needed to call my pastor or they would call the county Chaplin. She called the pastor and then she and her husband came over right away.
When the pastor got there, HE was allowed in the room with my baby boy, but yet, I still wasn't allowed in the room. He went into the room with Corban and he prayed standing over him and then read Psalm 23. Frankly, I wasn't too happy that this man I barely knew was allowed to stand in the room with my baby and I wasn't. Needless to say, Psalm 23 doesn't bring me the comfort it once used to. In fact, it's hard to read any of the Psalms at all.
I will tell you more about what happened next, next time. Until another day! May God bless you in your path!!
When Corban was 5.5 months old it was March 28th. I was working at Lowe's at the time and it was a Saturday. The night before (Friday the 27th), I worked until closing and hadn't gotten home from work until 12, or maybe later. It was my habit to kiss both of my boys on the forehead each night I came in late. But I was so tired from closing that night, I decided to just go to bed and not take the extra 2 minutes to go check on them. I had to be at work at 8 the next morning. Corban woke up crying around 5:30am and I poked my husband and asked him to go check on Corban. My husband quieted him very quickly and came back to bed saying, "he just dropped his binky." (pacifier) I didn't think another thought of it and I rolled over and went back to sleep.
Saturday morning, I was getting ready and I was headed into get him up and feed him before I went to work. Michael stopped me and told me that he wanted me to let him sleep longer. He offered to just feed Corban whenever he woke up. I finished getting ready for work at a more leisurely pace, grateful that Michael was going to help out that morning.
I went to work and was discussing something with my boss when I got a phone call. I answered the phone and when I found out it was my husband I was so embarrassed. Even though he had never called me at work before, I asked him if I could call him back on my lunch break. He said no that he needed my opinion. He said, "I think Corban may be sick. He's blue, should I call an ambulance??" I'm quite sure that my face turned either really red or really white. When I said, "blue?", my boss got on the loud speaker and asked for one of my coworkers to come to the aisle we were standing in.
That day my car was in the shop for an oil change and I had no way home. My co-worker drove me home and half way home, I realized that Michael was trying to tell me that Corban was dead. Sure enough, when I got home there were 2 or 3 police cars in the driveway, but no ambulance. I stormed into the house to go check on my baby boy. The police officer told me that he had died. While restraining me, he told me that I wasn't allowed to touch him in case it was a homicide. I COULDN'T TOUCH MY OWN BABY!!!!!
My husband just stood there in shock and I went to the living room to cry on the couch. My coworker came in to console me and give me a hug. He offered to take Von out for lunch, because at the age of 3 he wouldn't understand why policemen kept showing up at the house. Soon after my coworker took Von, we had close to 10 police cars at our house.
I called one of the ladies from the quilting group and asked her to call the pastor because the police officer said that I needed to call my pastor or they would call the county Chaplin. She called the pastor and then she and her husband came over right away.
When the pastor got there, HE was allowed in the room with my baby boy, but yet, I still wasn't allowed in the room. He went into the room with Corban and he prayed standing over him and then read Psalm 23. Frankly, I wasn't too happy that this man I barely knew was allowed to stand in the room with my baby and I wasn't. Needless to say, Psalm 23 doesn't bring me the comfort it once used to. In fact, it's hard to read any of the Psalms at all.
I will tell you more about what happened next, next time. Until another day! May God bless you in your path!!
Corban Kale
When Von was 3, Michael and I had a second son. Corban Kale is what we named him. Little did we know at the time that Kale was a vegetable! Ha! We just knew that Kale meant free man. Corban was born in East Tennessee a month or two before Michael graduated with his MBA. He was born in October. Beautiful weather in East TN during that time of year.
Even though I wasn't very protective of Von as a baby, I was extremely protective of Corban. While we were still in the hospital, I placed Corban in my bed that would make someone reach over me to get to him. The nurses in the hospital kept trying to take him back to the nurses station for normal newborn testing. They would come in and ask for him and I would want a detailed description of why they wanted him. Typical helicopter mom (something I had never been.)
They came into my room around 10 or 11 pm the night after he was born and told me they were going to check his bilirubin levels. I drifted in and out of sleep until 12pm and I got up to see why they hadn't brought him back to my room. They told me that he was still waiting to have the test done. I thought to myself, "WHAT?!?!? Why did they come and get him and he is still waiting 1 or 2 hours later!!" I expressed my dislike and demanded to have my baby back. They told me that he would be done within the next 15 minutes. Because I was weak from giving birth that day, I wondered back to my room. I came back at 12:30am, 1:00am, 1:30am and 2am. Finally, I told them I wasn't going to leave the desk until I had Corban back. They brought him right out and gave him to me. I lost almost a full night of sleep because they wanted to dawdle with my baby in the "nursery." They kept telling me it was because they wanted me to get some sleep! HA! Little did they know that I wasn't going to get any sleep until I had Corban back. Once I got Corban back into the room with me, I placed him on my side between me and the wall again and fell asleep the rest of the night. Corban slept and let me sleep until my parents came into visit with me around 8 the next morning!
Corban had jaundice, just like Von, but his was a bit worse than Von's. Corban had to lay under a uv light in our home for 3 days. He could be blind if he didn't have the blinder patches on. He kept taking the blinder's off so, between mom and I we were staying up around the clock for those 3 days. That was exhausting!!! We took 3 to 4 hour shifts 24 hours a day for those three days.
Once Corban got rid of Jaundice, he was one of the happiest babies I have EVER met. He never cried unless I had forgotten to feed him for too long. He would cry for a short time if he woke up in the middle of the night. But often in the mornings I would go in his room and check on him and he would just be in his room cuing and talking to himself. It was adorable!!
When Corban was about 3 months old, we moved to southern MD. I was 8 hours away from my parents!! This was the first time ever that I lived more than 15 miles from my parents!! Going from 15 to 500, was a very big deal to me. But I was excited for a new adventure, so I just focused on integrating myself into the community right away! I got involved in a quilting group at a church and they invited me to a women's Bible study.
Even though I wasn't very protective of Von as a baby, I was extremely protective of Corban. While we were still in the hospital, I placed Corban in my bed that would make someone reach over me to get to him. The nurses in the hospital kept trying to take him back to the nurses station for normal newborn testing. They would come in and ask for him and I would want a detailed description of why they wanted him. Typical helicopter mom (something I had never been.)
They came into my room around 10 or 11 pm the night after he was born and told me they were going to check his bilirubin levels. I drifted in and out of sleep until 12pm and I got up to see why they hadn't brought him back to my room. They told me that he was still waiting to have the test done. I thought to myself, "WHAT?!?!? Why did they come and get him and he is still waiting 1 or 2 hours later!!" I expressed my dislike and demanded to have my baby back. They told me that he would be done within the next 15 minutes. Because I was weak from giving birth that day, I wondered back to my room. I came back at 12:30am, 1:00am, 1:30am and 2am. Finally, I told them I wasn't going to leave the desk until I had Corban back. They brought him right out and gave him to me. I lost almost a full night of sleep because they wanted to dawdle with my baby in the "nursery." They kept telling me it was because they wanted me to get some sleep! HA! Little did they know that I wasn't going to get any sleep until I had Corban back. Once I got Corban back into the room with me, I placed him on my side between me and the wall again and fell asleep the rest of the night. Corban slept and let me sleep until my parents came into visit with me around 8 the next morning!
Corban had jaundice, just like Von, but his was a bit worse than Von's. Corban had to lay under a uv light in our home for 3 days. He could be blind if he didn't have the blinder patches on. He kept taking the blinder's off so, between mom and I we were staying up around the clock for those 3 days. That was exhausting!!! We took 3 to 4 hour shifts 24 hours a day for those three days.
Once Corban got rid of Jaundice, he was one of the happiest babies I have EVER met. He never cried unless I had forgotten to feed him for too long. He would cry for a short time if he woke up in the middle of the night. But often in the mornings I would go in his room and check on him and he would just be in his room cuing and talking to himself. It was adorable!!
When Corban was about 3 months old, we moved to southern MD. I was 8 hours away from my parents!! This was the first time ever that I lived more than 15 miles from my parents!! Going from 15 to 500, was a very big deal to me. But I was excited for a new adventure, so I just focused on integrating myself into the community right away! I got involved in a quilting group at a church and they invited me to a women's Bible study.
Friday, March 21, 2014
Von
Von has been a challenging child to raise. As I said in my last post, he started with jaundice and colic. As he started growing older, I noticed little things that seemed weird. He lined up his cars rather than playing with them. He would place something in the middle of his bedroom and if someone moved it, he would throw a temper tantrum. By the time he was two, he still struggled with walking, but he was able to walk. He wasn't talking at all. He would point and say, "kah" for anything he wanted, whether it be his pacifier or food or one of his toys.
Michael stopped flying for a living when Von was 3 or 4 months old. He decided to go back to school full time and get his Master's degree. He had some credit hours but no degree so it was kind of like starting from scratch. He attended 2 schools so that he could take a total of 24 to 30 hours each semester until he got into the MBA program. Needless to say, Michael wasn't around a whole lot therefore wasn't truly seeing all of the strange things going on with Von. And I was working full-time so it was a struggle for me to see it enough to know something was really wrong.
Von was eating a normal diet when he was on baby food, he would eat anything I fed him from peas to chicken and even broccoli! When we started feeding him a typical diet with texture rather than smashed foods, he started becoming a picky eater. His diet selections were getting smaller and smaller and smaller, until by the age of 2, all he would eat was hot dogs and peas! I could set food in front of him and he would refuse to eat until we put what he wanted in front of him. I tried even putting cookies, cake, ice cream and popsicles in front of him just to see if I could get him to eat anything new. My mother told me that if he got hungry enough, he would eat. So, I stopped giving him food he would eat for 2.5 days before I finally gave in and gave him hot dogs and peas again.
I took him to his pediatrician and he told me that nothing was wrong with him and that all kids go through a phase of not eating much. I didn't like that answer. I heard the school system would do Speech therapy and occupational therapy evaluations for infants and toddlers. I had NO idea what occupational therapy was so I just requested a speech evaluation. The lady that came to our house to evaluate him said that I need to see someone in a private practice for occupational therapy because the services he needed, the schools couldn't provide.
So, I took him to an outpatient clinic that provided speech, physical and occupational therapy. They told me that it was a good thing I brought him in because he would have likely been on a feeding tube by the time he was 5!!!!! They also thought that he may have a mild form of autism!!!
Obviously, we started him on therapy at the age of 2.5, when we had all the evaluations completed. They put him in speech therapy, occupational therapy and food therapy! Who knew food therapy even existed!?!?! I sure didn't. So, we started going and Von started eating foods that I thought he would never eat again! They discharged him from food therapy about 9 months later. He would eat ALMOST anything. To this day, he doesn't like sauerkraut or broccoli, but who can blame him. There are foods that he would prefer not to eat, but he will eat almost anything he is served. It was an amazing therapy!
After about 3 months of speech therapy, he was talking, granted he was very hard to understand. He would say something and if you didn't repeat what he said, he would say it over and over and over again until you repeated what you heard him saying. He wanted to make sure that you heard him. After 6 months of speech therapy, they discharged him. He had gone from a vocabulary of 1 word, "kah" to a vocabulary of a 7 year old child!! You could even understand the majority of what he was trying to say! To this day, he will say some things over and over and over until you repeat them back to him or you respond in a manner that he KNOWS you heard what he said and he is 8 years old.
Occupational therapy... well, he still needs occupational therapy(OT) here and there, but he was discharged after 4.5 years. I sat in watching his OT sessions. I thought, how absurd is this!! They are sitting and playing with him. What is this accomplishing?? After a while, I started asking questions. Why are you setting him in a bin full of dry beans, scooping the beans and dumping them on his legs? Answer: This works on decreasing his sensitivity to touch. Why are you placing blocks one on top of the other? Answer: These are 1" blocks and they work on eye-hand coordination as well as pinch strength. Why are you clipping clothes pins in random places? Answer: Do you see how he has to use two hands to open in? This strengthens his hands so that he can hold a pencil better when he gets older. What good does it do to swing my child on a swing? Answer: This helps with balance. Remember how he would be walking or running and would just fall over? This helps him find the middle ground and become successful when leaning, walking, reaching, running or jumping. Why do you have him on his belly on a scooter picking up bean bags and then taking him to the other side of the room on his belly? Answer: Do you remember how he will randomly run into door frames? He thinks he has enough space between him and the door, but he misjudges it because he is unaware of where his body is. The pressure on his shoulder and arm joints tell his body where those joints are.
When they discharged him from therapy, they had decided that it wasn't autism but something called sensory processing disorder. Sensory processing disorder is problems caused by not understanding your senses correctly. A person touches you, but you feel a thousand needles pricking you. What would you do? Of course, you would turn around and slap that person's hand off of you! You sit down to eat something, you put it in your mouth and it feels like a slug crawling down your throat. What would you do? Spit it out!! You are walking down the hallway and you feel like your leaning to the side. What would you do? Lean to the other side, but what if you leaned to the other side and you were actually standing straight. You fall over. These are some of the things my little boy was experiencing and still experiences at times.
Sensory processing disorder is hard to deal with. Imagine walking through a store, and the longer you are in the store, the brighter the lights seem. You are going to start trying to find your way out of the store. But then if your mom put you into the shopping cart, what are you going to do. Cry "I wanna go home." If you are young, you cannot explain why, so you just keep crying. What does that look like to people around you. I'll give you a hint... They definitely don't think you are a poster mom who does everything right. In fact, you have several little old ladies come and tell you that you should get your child in order. You have people walk by and say things like, "Wow, if she would only discipline that child he wouldn't act that way."
After everything was explained to me, I started to slowly know what they were working on when they switched from one activity to the next. I would begin seeing the activity, evaluating what they were doing, thinking about his goals and then asking are you working on...this? As I watched I became more and more aware of what I should do at home with him. But I still had a lot to learn. Life with Von is still hard at times, but learning with him became easier when I started understanding where the problems stemmed from. We still have to let him stand while he eats, bounce and flap his hands when he is excited and cry when he is over stimulated. But we have come a long way from where we were.
Until another day! May God bless you in your path!!
Michael stopped flying for a living when Von was 3 or 4 months old. He decided to go back to school full time and get his Master's degree. He had some credit hours but no degree so it was kind of like starting from scratch. He attended 2 schools so that he could take a total of 24 to 30 hours each semester until he got into the MBA program. Needless to say, Michael wasn't around a whole lot therefore wasn't truly seeing all of the strange things going on with Von. And I was working full-time so it was a struggle for me to see it enough to know something was really wrong.
Von was eating a normal diet when he was on baby food, he would eat anything I fed him from peas to chicken and even broccoli! When we started feeding him a typical diet with texture rather than smashed foods, he started becoming a picky eater. His diet selections were getting smaller and smaller and smaller, until by the age of 2, all he would eat was hot dogs and peas! I could set food in front of him and he would refuse to eat until we put what he wanted in front of him. I tried even putting cookies, cake, ice cream and popsicles in front of him just to see if I could get him to eat anything new. My mother told me that if he got hungry enough, he would eat. So, I stopped giving him food he would eat for 2.5 days before I finally gave in and gave him hot dogs and peas again.
I took him to his pediatrician and he told me that nothing was wrong with him and that all kids go through a phase of not eating much. I didn't like that answer. I heard the school system would do Speech therapy and occupational therapy evaluations for infants and toddlers. I had NO idea what occupational therapy was so I just requested a speech evaluation. The lady that came to our house to evaluate him said that I need to see someone in a private practice for occupational therapy because the services he needed, the schools couldn't provide.
So, I took him to an outpatient clinic that provided speech, physical and occupational therapy. They told me that it was a good thing I brought him in because he would have likely been on a feeding tube by the time he was 5!!!!! They also thought that he may have a mild form of autism!!!
Obviously, we started him on therapy at the age of 2.5, when we had all the evaluations completed. They put him in speech therapy, occupational therapy and food therapy! Who knew food therapy even existed!?!?! I sure didn't. So, we started going and Von started eating foods that I thought he would never eat again! They discharged him from food therapy about 9 months later. He would eat ALMOST anything. To this day, he doesn't like sauerkraut or broccoli, but who can blame him. There are foods that he would prefer not to eat, but he will eat almost anything he is served. It was an amazing therapy!
After about 3 months of speech therapy, he was talking, granted he was very hard to understand. He would say something and if you didn't repeat what he said, he would say it over and over and over again until you repeated what you heard him saying. He wanted to make sure that you heard him. After 6 months of speech therapy, they discharged him. He had gone from a vocabulary of 1 word, "kah" to a vocabulary of a 7 year old child!! You could even understand the majority of what he was trying to say! To this day, he will say some things over and over and over until you repeat them back to him or you respond in a manner that he KNOWS you heard what he said and he is 8 years old.
Occupational therapy... well, he still needs occupational therapy(OT) here and there, but he was discharged after 4.5 years. I sat in watching his OT sessions. I thought, how absurd is this!! They are sitting and playing with him. What is this accomplishing?? After a while, I started asking questions. Why are you setting him in a bin full of dry beans, scooping the beans and dumping them on his legs? Answer: This works on decreasing his sensitivity to touch. Why are you placing blocks one on top of the other? Answer: These are 1" blocks and they work on eye-hand coordination as well as pinch strength. Why are you clipping clothes pins in random places? Answer: Do you see how he has to use two hands to open in? This strengthens his hands so that he can hold a pencil better when he gets older. What good does it do to swing my child on a swing? Answer: This helps with balance. Remember how he would be walking or running and would just fall over? This helps him find the middle ground and become successful when leaning, walking, reaching, running or jumping. Why do you have him on his belly on a scooter picking up bean bags and then taking him to the other side of the room on his belly? Answer: Do you remember how he will randomly run into door frames? He thinks he has enough space between him and the door, but he misjudges it because he is unaware of where his body is. The pressure on his shoulder and arm joints tell his body where those joints are.
When they discharged him from therapy, they had decided that it wasn't autism but something called sensory processing disorder. Sensory processing disorder is problems caused by not understanding your senses correctly. A person touches you, but you feel a thousand needles pricking you. What would you do? Of course, you would turn around and slap that person's hand off of you! You sit down to eat something, you put it in your mouth and it feels like a slug crawling down your throat. What would you do? Spit it out!! You are walking down the hallway and you feel like your leaning to the side. What would you do? Lean to the other side, but what if you leaned to the other side and you were actually standing straight. You fall over. These are some of the things my little boy was experiencing and still experiences at times.
Sensory processing disorder is hard to deal with. Imagine walking through a store, and the longer you are in the store, the brighter the lights seem. You are going to start trying to find your way out of the store. But then if your mom put you into the shopping cart, what are you going to do. Cry "I wanna go home." If you are young, you cannot explain why, so you just keep crying. What does that look like to people around you. I'll give you a hint... They definitely don't think you are a poster mom who does everything right. In fact, you have several little old ladies come and tell you that you should get your child in order. You have people walk by and say things like, "Wow, if she would only discipline that child he wouldn't act that way."
After everything was explained to me, I started to slowly know what they were working on when they switched from one activity to the next. I would begin seeing the activity, evaluating what they were doing, thinking about his goals and then asking are you working on...this? As I watched I became more and more aware of what I should do at home with him. But I still had a lot to learn. Life with Von is still hard at times, but learning with him became easier when I started understanding where the problems stemmed from. We still have to let him stand while he eats, bounce and flap his hands when he is excited and cry when he is over stimulated. But we have come a long way from where we were.
Until another day! May God bless you in your path!!
Saturday, March 15, 2014
Onto the next stage
Within the first year of our marriage, I found out that I had tumors in both breasts. I became anxious and weak. I still had my faith, but I didn't utilize the power of prayer during that time of my life. Everything was hard because I didn't look to God for comfort. I remember when I was in the hospital, I had to fast until 2pm before the surgery. All I could think about before getting the IV was food. I had to have a wire inserted into the tumor so that the surgeon could find it once the surgery started. In order to get the wire in the right place they had to put it in while I was awake and then have a mammogram completed. Because it had been so long since I had eaten, when my body went through the stress of having the wire inserted into the tumor, I stood up for the mammogram and fainted several times during the imaging process. I can remember the nurse shouting at me because I couldn't stand up straight. It was an awful day, but my parents brought me a salad from Applebee's afterwords and that made the whole thing worth it!! It took a few months but they ran the tumors through 9 different labs!! 5 said the tumors was benign (non-cancerous), 4 said the tumors was cancerous. So, the doctor told us that it wasn't cancerous.
In 2004, we wanted a house!! When we were looking for a house, we wanted one that would be structurally sound so that we wouldn't have dramatic repair bills. But we wanted a good deal on a house too! So, I started looking. I found this house that was priced 30,000 under market value and convinced Michael that we MUST go look at it! It was a foreclosure, so we expected that it wouldn't be in the greatest of shape. We got there and there were a few holes in the asphalt driveway.... not a big deal, we can fill those. The yard was full of trash and leaves... again, not a big deal because we could clean them up! We went into this house and it had an overwhelming smell of cat urine!! I thought I was going to puke!! When we looked at this house, the electricity was turned off, so we had to use flashlights for parts of the house. I remember walking through the house, looking at all the different colors! The living room was lemon yellow! The dining room had some kind of bamboo wallpaper. The kitchen had wallpaper that was mostly ivory, but it had what looked like paint splatters on it. These paint splatters were country blue, mint green and pepto bismal pink! We looked at the bedrooms. One was white with a HORRIBLE baby blue faux finish on top. I wish I had taken a picture and I would have posted it! Another one was white with a HORRIBLE lavender purple faux finish!! We went to look in the bathroom in the hall. It was a fluorescent orange/coral color!! The master bedroom and bath were OK. They were a periwinkle color. But what made this room and bathroom hideous was it had bright yellow suns and moons stenciled on the walls! Needless to say, it wasn't done with the best of artwork... In the master bathroom, the counter top was originally a mauve pink. But they had decided they wanted to paint it Volunteer orange. The paint job was bad enough that you could still see the pink streaking through!! There were holes in several of the doors. But we bought the house!! The basement was unfinished but had some wood panelling up for walls so it wasn't bare concrete. It was structurally sound! We spent approximately 10,000 on renovations and the house was beautiful!
Michael made the basement into his "man cave." And I took care of the upstairs. When Michael was in his man cave, he made it clear that I was only allowed to pass through or come ask him a question, but unless invited, I wasn't to be down there. Again, I was still very naive and didn't know the reason. His reason was that he didn't want me to know how much he was drinking. I still thought he just really like orange juice.
In 2005, we had a little boy! Because of my depressed state, I struggled to enjoy caring for him. Everything about taking care of a baby seemed hard. I wanted a baby because I thought it would take me out of my depression. We named our little boy Von. As a baby, Von was a very challenging baby. He had jaundice and the colic. If you don't know what colic is, your lucky! Colic is a stomach disorder that babies have that make them cry for no reason at all. He would just cry and cry and cry. Around 4 months old, we found out that he was allergic to milk products. So, I stopped breast feeding and we started feeding him soy formula. This change helped some, but the crying didn't totally stop.
Another reason I stopped breast feed was because we found more breast tumors. When I had those removed, a very good friend of mine stayed with me and helped me take care of Von. God blessed me with her as a very good friend in my time of need. She helped me see that taking care of Von was supposed to be a delightful duty because that was my gift from God! Even though it was still challenging to take care of Von, I gained a new perspective. I was serving GOD when I took care of my son!! Somehow this made it a little easier.
In 2004, we wanted a house!! When we were looking for a house, we wanted one that would be structurally sound so that we wouldn't have dramatic repair bills. But we wanted a good deal on a house too! So, I started looking. I found this house that was priced 30,000 under market value and convinced Michael that we MUST go look at it! It was a foreclosure, so we expected that it wouldn't be in the greatest of shape. We got there and there were a few holes in the asphalt driveway.... not a big deal, we can fill those. The yard was full of trash and leaves... again, not a big deal because we could clean them up! We went into this house and it had an overwhelming smell of cat urine!! I thought I was going to puke!! When we looked at this house, the electricity was turned off, so we had to use flashlights for parts of the house. I remember walking through the house, looking at all the different colors! The living room was lemon yellow! The dining room had some kind of bamboo wallpaper. The kitchen had wallpaper that was mostly ivory, but it had what looked like paint splatters on it. These paint splatters were country blue, mint green and pepto bismal pink! We looked at the bedrooms. One was white with a HORRIBLE baby blue faux finish on top. I wish I had taken a picture and I would have posted it! Another one was white with a HORRIBLE lavender purple faux finish!! We went to look in the bathroom in the hall. It was a fluorescent orange/coral color!! The master bedroom and bath were OK. They were a periwinkle color. But what made this room and bathroom hideous was it had bright yellow suns and moons stenciled on the walls! Needless to say, it wasn't done with the best of artwork... In the master bathroom, the counter top was originally a mauve pink. But they had decided they wanted to paint it Volunteer orange. The paint job was bad enough that you could still see the pink streaking through!! There were holes in several of the doors. But we bought the house!! The basement was unfinished but had some wood panelling up for walls so it wasn't bare concrete. It was structurally sound! We spent approximately 10,000 on renovations and the house was beautiful!
Michael made the basement into his "man cave." And I took care of the upstairs. When Michael was in his man cave, he made it clear that I was only allowed to pass through or come ask him a question, but unless invited, I wasn't to be down there. Again, I was still very naive and didn't know the reason. His reason was that he didn't want me to know how much he was drinking. I still thought he just really like orange juice.
In 2005, we had a little boy! Because of my depressed state, I struggled to enjoy caring for him. Everything about taking care of a baby seemed hard. I wanted a baby because I thought it would take me out of my depression. We named our little boy Von. As a baby, Von was a very challenging baby. He had jaundice and the colic. If you don't know what colic is, your lucky! Colic is a stomach disorder that babies have that make them cry for no reason at all. He would just cry and cry and cry. Around 4 months old, we found out that he was allergic to milk products. So, I stopped breast feeding and we started feeding him soy formula. This change helped some, but the crying didn't totally stop.
Another reason I stopped breast feed was because we found more breast tumors. When I had those removed, a very good friend of mine stayed with me and helped me take care of Von. God blessed me with her as a very good friend in my time of need. She helped me see that taking care of Von was supposed to be a delightful duty because that was my gift from God! Even though it was still challenging to take care of Von, I gained a new perspective. I was serving GOD when I took care of my son!! Somehow this made it a little easier.
Wednesday, March 12, 2014
The Honeymooners
A couple points that I forgot to mention in my last post. In November of 2001, Michael decided to give his life to Christ! I was so happy that my new best friend had just become a Christian! As he was growing in his knowledge of Christ, I became more and more attracted to him! He started attending Liberty University online and was taking courses in the New and Old Testament! We had so much we could talk about through that time! We were close before, but with his growing faith in Christ, we were as close as anyone could possibly be!
When we announced our engagement, we announced to each of our closest friends and family members in person, rather than a big announcement! When we called to tell Michael's parents, they said they had news for us too! So, we asked them to go first. They told us they were going to get a divorce. The separation didn't prove to be helpful, so the next thing that needed to happen was the divorce. Michael was greatly disappointed, but we had both seen it coming. Then, we told my parents. Of course, they already knew because Michael asked my dad for my hand in marriage. Then we told my best friend, and then His best friend. His best friend lived an hour away, so we had him down to Michael's apartment for supper. His friend said that he had news for us too. So, when he got to the apartment, Michael told his friend to tell us his news first. His friend had been married for 12 years at that point. He announced that he and his wife got a divorce two weeks ago. How discouraging is that!?!?! Michael goes to announce he is engaged and his parents and best friend announce at the same time, that they are getting a divorce! Oh well, we charged on anyway.
So, back to 2003, we got married. While we were looking for a church to get married in, we decided to attend this cute little church. During the service, the pastor handed out lollypops to all the kids in the congregation. He came up and handed one to both of us! Even though we were thoroughly embarrassed, we loved the look of the church and chose that church to get married in.
On the day of our wedding, I refused to wear shoes. I couldn't be towering over Michael in all the pictures!!! So, we have these cute little pictures of me and my flower girl showing off our bare feet! While were getting ready, I was drinking my daily Diet Dr. Pepper. I spilled a couple drops on my wedding dress. I thought, "no, big deal. I'll just get a paper towel and wipe it off." So, I went into the ladies room and found a paper towel. The paper towels were white with a green ivy print on them. I wet the paper towel and started to rub it on the spot that I had dripped. That place on my dress turned from light brown soda color to bright green!! I was horrified! The spot was just above my belly button and would be seen in ALL of our wedding photos! The good news.. I had a HUGE bouquet. When I held my bouquet, it covered my stained dress. Whew! What a relief! Until... I held it for a couple minutes... The florist later told me that my bouquet was between 15 and 20 lbs! There was a bazillion pictures to take. Needless to say, my arms were sore the next day!
I had the perfect wedding! The weather couldn't have been nicer! The decorations fit perfectly on the rows just as we had imagined! Almost everyone that I loved was able to come! There were no kids wailing throughout the service. It was just beautiful...until...during our "I do's" my best friend's mother's cell phone rings! AND she answered it!! The good news was, she left the room and we were able to continue on with our beautiful ceremony.
We went to Cancun for our honeymoon!! It was beautiful there!! It was the first time I had left the country! In Mexico I was legal to drink, even though I was only 19! So, I tried some of my first alcohol. They put it with all kinds of juices and it was awesome! I didn't want to get drunk or even feel tipsy, so I didn't have many, but they were really yummy! My husband, yes, it felt super weird to call him "my husband", drank more than I thought was necessary. However, I didn't know how much was too much, so I didn't think much of it! We stayed down there for a week. The day before we came home, we went snorkeling. It was a lot of fun looking at the coral reef and all the different colored fish swimming around us! To get to the snorkeling sight we took a ferry to a dock. Then at that dock, we got onto some jet skis and rode out to the reef. We had lunch at a little cafe, then we rode the jet skis and the ferry back to our resort. I had forgotten to wear sunscreen that day. Well, I have red hair and super, super white skin! So, as I'm sure you can imagine, I got a sunburn! But it wasn't red! It was beyond red, it was purple!!!! By that evening, I was in bed shivering with a temperature!!! I had sun poisoning. The last day we were there, we had planned a parasail ride. We paid for it in advance, so we couldn't get out of it. We went on it, but all I remember about it was how much my sandals hurt my feet and how cold the wind was on my skin. It was a disappointing in to a super fun honeymoon.
Soon after we got married, my mother-in-law came for a visit. She was just as nice as she could be! While she was visiting from Nebraska, our wedding photos came in. I thought of a great idea! My father-in-law was going to be visiting from Nebraska 2 months after she left. So, I suggested that my mother-in-law take my wedding photos back to Nebraska and order the ones she wanted. Then she could give them to her parents to look at them. Her parents were still great friends with my father-in-law, so they could give the pictures to him and he could show his parents the pictures. Then, when he came back to our house, he could have what everyone wanted to order and bring my wedding pictures back to me!! :-) This sounds like a great idea...right??
Well, it WAS a great idea until it backfired. My mother-in-law not only didn't get along with my father-in-law, but apparently she didn't get along with her parents either. She didn't tell me this when the pictures were here. She just took the pictures as if she agreed with the plan even though she had no intention of getting them to any of the rest of the family. Two weeks before my father-in-law was going to come out to visit, I gave her a call and kindly asked why she hadn't gotten the pictures to anyone else yet. She told me that she just hadn't gotten around to it and that she would get the pictures out to the rest of the family soon. I was ok with that answer and went on about my business. A week later, no one had seen the pictures. I called and the same exchange happened. Well, three days before my father-in-law was supposed to leave Nebraska and come back to Tennessee, I called up my mother-in-law. I said to her, "You have two choices right now. You can get them to your ex-husband TONIGHT. Or you can put them in the mail to me first thing in the morning. What's it going to be?" I said it quiet and calm, yet very direct. Her tearful, whiny response was, "I need to talk to my son." She cried to Michael for hours upon hours!! I finally told him that he needed to wrap it up about 2am. Thankfully he did and he came to bed and asked me what I had said to her. I told him. He wasn't to happy about it...
The first year of our marriage was HARD!!! I couldn't seem to do much of anything right!! My mother had done so much for me that I didn't know about!! Trying to keep up with the whole household was a lot harder than I thought. But even with all my efforts and striving, I was unable to keep it clean enough for my husband's expectations.
When we got married, Michael decided that I couldn't go to my parent's church anymore because the guy that raped me continued to attend that church. I understood his concern, so we started church shopping. At that time in my life, I was very easy going and could fit into almost any church he wanted to attend. I would get settled into a church very quickly. He would be ok with going to a church for a few months and then he wouldn't let me go anymore. We changed churches every 3 to 6 months until we had tried every church in the area and none of them were "good enough." He said that there just wasn't a good fit for him. So we stopped attending any church all together. This was a very depressing time in my life. Strangely, I didn't know why I was depressed. Looking back, it was obvious that I wasn't in fellowship with ANY body of believers! And because of that, I wasn't being held accountable for ANYTHING! My devotion time with God took a big hit too.
Since Michael was a pilot, he kept all kinds of crazy sleep schedules, but I needed my normal beauty sleep! I would go to bed early and Michael would stay up late watching the news or doing who knows what. After a few months, I found out that he was staying up late in order to drink enough to put him to sleep. As time went on, he stopped hiding it from me altogether and only hid most of it. I still didn't really know that he had a drinking problem. I just didn't like him drinking, so I thought that I was overreacting...because that is what he told me...I was overreacting and that he had it all under control. So, I just took that in stride and assumed he was telling me the truth.
That was the end of our honeymoon stage. It can only get better from here...right?
Until next time! May God bless you in your path!
When we announced our engagement, we announced to each of our closest friends and family members in person, rather than a big announcement! When we called to tell Michael's parents, they said they had news for us too! So, we asked them to go first. They told us they were going to get a divorce. The separation didn't prove to be helpful, so the next thing that needed to happen was the divorce. Michael was greatly disappointed, but we had both seen it coming. Then, we told my parents. Of course, they already knew because Michael asked my dad for my hand in marriage. Then we told my best friend, and then His best friend. His best friend lived an hour away, so we had him down to Michael's apartment for supper. His friend said that he had news for us too. So, when he got to the apartment, Michael told his friend to tell us his news first. His friend had been married for 12 years at that point. He announced that he and his wife got a divorce two weeks ago. How discouraging is that!?!?! Michael goes to announce he is engaged and his parents and best friend announce at the same time, that they are getting a divorce! Oh well, we charged on anyway.
So, back to 2003, we got married. While we were looking for a church to get married in, we decided to attend this cute little church. During the service, the pastor handed out lollypops to all the kids in the congregation. He came up and handed one to both of us! Even though we were thoroughly embarrassed, we loved the look of the church and chose that church to get married in.
On the day of our wedding, I refused to wear shoes. I couldn't be towering over Michael in all the pictures!!! So, we have these cute little pictures of me and my flower girl showing off our bare feet! While were getting ready, I was drinking my daily Diet Dr. Pepper. I spilled a couple drops on my wedding dress. I thought, "no, big deal. I'll just get a paper towel and wipe it off." So, I went into the ladies room and found a paper towel. The paper towels were white with a green ivy print on them. I wet the paper towel and started to rub it on the spot that I had dripped. That place on my dress turned from light brown soda color to bright green!! I was horrified! The spot was just above my belly button and would be seen in ALL of our wedding photos! The good news.. I had a HUGE bouquet. When I held my bouquet, it covered my stained dress. Whew! What a relief! Until... I held it for a couple minutes... The florist later told me that my bouquet was between 15 and 20 lbs! There was a bazillion pictures to take. Needless to say, my arms were sore the next day!
I had the perfect wedding! The weather couldn't have been nicer! The decorations fit perfectly on the rows just as we had imagined! Almost everyone that I loved was able to come! There were no kids wailing throughout the service. It was just beautiful...until...during our "I do's" my best friend's mother's cell phone rings! AND she answered it!! The good news was, she left the room and we were able to continue on with our beautiful ceremony.
We went to Cancun for our honeymoon!! It was beautiful there!! It was the first time I had left the country! In Mexico I was legal to drink, even though I was only 19! So, I tried some of my first alcohol. They put it with all kinds of juices and it was awesome! I didn't want to get drunk or even feel tipsy, so I didn't have many, but they were really yummy! My husband, yes, it felt super weird to call him "my husband", drank more than I thought was necessary. However, I didn't know how much was too much, so I didn't think much of it! We stayed down there for a week. The day before we came home, we went snorkeling. It was a lot of fun looking at the coral reef and all the different colored fish swimming around us! To get to the snorkeling sight we took a ferry to a dock. Then at that dock, we got onto some jet skis and rode out to the reef. We had lunch at a little cafe, then we rode the jet skis and the ferry back to our resort. I had forgotten to wear sunscreen that day. Well, I have red hair and super, super white skin! So, as I'm sure you can imagine, I got a sunburn! But it wasn't red! It was beyond red, it was purple!!!! By that evening, I was in bed shivering with a temperature!!! I had sun poisoning. The last day we were there, we had planned a parasail ride. We paid for it in advance, so we couldn't get out of it. We went on it, but all I remember about it was how much my sandals hurt my feet and how cold the wind was on my skin. It was a disappointing in to a super fun honeymoon.
Soon after we got married, my mother-in-law came for a visit. She was just as nice as she could be! While she was visiting from Nebraska, our wedding photos came in. I thought of a great idea! My father-in-law was going to be visiting from Nebraska 2 months after she left. So, I suggested that my mother-in-law take my wedding photos back to Nebraska and order the ones she wanted. Then she could give them to her parents to look at them. Her parents were still great friends with my father-in-law, so they could give the pictures to him and he could show his parents the pictures. Then, when he came back to our house, he could have what everyone wanted to order and bring my wedding pictures back to me!! :-) This sounds like a great idea...right??
Well, it WAS a great idea until it backfired. My mother-in-law not only didn't get along with my father-in-law, but apparently she didn't get along with her parents either. She didn't tell me this when the pictures were here. She just took the pictures as if she agreed with the plan even though she had no intention of getting them to any of the rest of the family. Two weeks before my father-in-law was going to come out to visit, I gave her a call and kindly asked why she hadn't gotten the pictures to anyone else yet. She told me that she just hadn't gotten around to it and that she would get the pictures out to the rest of the family soon. I was ok with that answer and went on about my business. A week later, no one had seen the pictures. I called and the same exchange happened. Well, three days before my father-in-law was supposed to leave Nebraska and come back to Tennessee, I called up my mother-in-law. I said to her, "You have two choices right now. You can get them to your ex-husband TONIGHT. Or you can put them in the mail to me first thing in the morning. What's it going to be?" I said it quiet and calm, yet very direct. Her tearful, whiny response was, "I need to talk to my son." She cried to Michael for hours upon hours!! I finally told him that he needed to wrap it up about 2am. Thankfully he did and he came to bed and asked me what I had said to her. I told him. He wasn't to happy about it...
The first year of our marriage was HARD!!! I couldn't seem to do much of anything right!! My mother had done so much for me that I didn't know about!! Trying to keep up with the whole household was a lot harder than I thought. But even with all my efforts and striving, I was unable to keep it clean enough for my husband's expectations.
When we got married, Michael decided that I couldn't go to my parent's church anymore because the guy that raped me continued to attend that church. I understood his concern, so we started church shopping. At that time in my life, I was very easy going and could fit into almost any church he wanted to attend. I would get settled into a church very quickly. He would be ok with going to a church for a few months and then he wouldn't let me go anymore. We changed churches every 3 to 6 months until we had tried every church in the area and none of them were "good enough." He said that there just wasn't a good fit for him. So we stopped attending any church all together. This was a very depressing time in my life. Strangely, I didn't know why I was depressed. Looking back, it was obvious that I wasn't in fellowship with ANY body of believers! And because of that, I wasn't being held accountable for ANYTHING! My devotion time with God took a big hit too.
Since Michael was a pilot, he kept all kinds of crazy sleep schedules, but I needed my normal beauty sleep! I would go to bed early and Michael would stay up late watching the news or doing who knows what. After a few months, I found out that he was staying up late in order to drink enough to put him to sleep. As time went on, he stopped hiding it from me altogether and only hid most of it. I still didn't really know that he had a drinking problem. I just didn't like him drinking, so I thought that I was overreacting...because that is what he told me...I was overreacting and that he had it all under control. So, I just took that in stride and assumed he was telling me the truth.
That was the end of our honeymoon stage. It can only get better from here...right?
Until next time! May God bless you in your path!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)